The cold, unyielding gray of the ceiling was the first thing that registered. My vision, still blurry at the edges, struggled to focus on the faint cracks that spiderwebbed across its surface. I blinked, the residual fog of whatever had happened clinging to my senses.
Slowly, cautiously, I lifted my arms. They moved with a strange, familiar ease. There was no throbbing pain, no searing ache, no hint of the shattering agony I vaguely remembered from a moment that felt both distant and terrifying. My muscles responded without protest, the joints flexed smoothly, as if they had never known injury. A jolt went through me – had it been a dream? A nightmare?
I tried to summon my weapon. I closed my eyes. A strange pressure built behind my eyes, a localized heat spreading through my arms, a sensation akin to blood rushing to the surface. It wasn't a feeling I recognized, yet it felt… right. Swiftly, a black goop made way to my arms. It was a viscous, inky black substance, shimmering with an unnatural sheen, reflecting the gloomy light of the room with an almost oily luminescence. It did not cover my arms fully, but covered it enough to make me realize that I really materialized my own weapon out of thin air in another world where magic is prominent. The substance pulsed with a faint, internal light, like a beating heart, radiating a cold energy that prickled my skin, a sensation both alien and undeniably powerful. This was no dream. This was real. This wasn't home...
It has been three days since the summoning, and we were forced to get trained by the 'TRUMP' descendants. You might be thinking, who are these 'TRUMP' descendants. But no worries, I will explain it to you. I had been forced to learn, to absorb the history of this land, alongside combat forms and magical incantations, becoming as much a part of our daily routine as the physical drills themselves.
The training was brutal, relentless. From dawn till dusk, we were pushed to our physical and magical limits, our bodies aching, our minds reeling from the sheer volume of information and the intensity of the drills. The Diamond family instructors, with their sharp eyes and even sharper blades, drilled us in swordsmanship, each parry and thrust meticulously critiqued. They moved like shadows, their movements fluid and deadly, making our clumsy attempts feel like a child's play, yet their patience, though stern, was unwavering. They would demonstrate a complex sequence, then watch with hawk-like intensity as we fumbled through it, offering precise, almost surgical corrections, demanding perfection with every swing. The Heart family, surprisingly, were not all gentle healers. While they taught us rudimentary support spells – minor healing, temporary buffs – their training also focused on endurance, on pushing through pain, on understanding the limits of our own bodies and minds. They believed true compassion lay in preparing us for the harsh realities of battle, in ensuring we could survive long enough to help others. Their exercises often involved pushing us to the brink of exhaustion, then teaching us how to draw on our inner reserves, how to mend our own minor injuries, and how to maintain focus even when our limbs screamed in protest, a grim lesson in self-preservation in a world where weakness meant death.
The Club family instructors were hulking figures, their muscles corded, their grunts echoing through the training grounds as they demonstrated devastating blows with oversized blunt weapons and even our own fists. They taught us raw power, how to channel our nascent magical energy into physical force, how to make every strike count. Their lessons were less about finesse and more about impact, about overwhelming an opponent with brute strength and unyielding resolve. They had us swinging heavy training maces until our arms felt like lead, practicing devastating charges, and learning to absorb powerful blows, turning our bodies into instruments of blunt force. And the Spade family, with their comforting voices and soft gazes, drilled us in the art of magical fortification, teaching us how to weave shields of energy, how to resist mental assaults, and how to project our will with unwavering conviction. Their lessons were often abstract, focusing on mental discipline and the manipulation of ambient magical energy, but their results were undeniable, as we learned to shrug off minor magical attacks that would have crippled us days earlier, building an internal resilience against unseen threats. They even taught us Alchemy.
The air in the training grounds was thick with the scent of sweat, ozone from crackling magic, and the metallic tang of fear, a constant reminder of the stakes. Every muscle in my body screamed in protest, a symphony of aches and pains, but I pushed through, driven by a desperate need to understand, to survive, to master this new, terrifying reality, to simply not be left behind in a world where only the strong endured.
It seems that from the very beginning of time, humans have been in war with demons. Their conflict was not merely a series of skirmishes or territorial disputes; it was a fundamental clash of existence, a deep-seated antagonism woven into the very fabric of their beings, a primal hatred that transcended generations, passed down through blood and lore, etched into the very stones of this world. Their history was endless cycles, a grim, repetitive pattern of rise and fall, each thread stained with blood and tears. We were in the vicious cycle where humans overthrew demons and demons overthrew humans. Humans would, through sheer force of will and ingenuity, gain the upper hand, pushing the demonic hordes back into the shadowy corners of the world, confining them to forgotten realms and desolate wastes. They would build their cities, cultivate their lands, and for a time, enjoy a fragile peace, a fleeting moment of respite where they dared to believe they had finally broken the cycle, that their suffering was at an end, only to be proven tragically wrong, time and time again.
It seems that just like humans, demons too have the capacity to spring up after being suppressed for several years. Their numbers would swell in the darkness, their power festering like a wound, until they burst forth once more, overwhelming human defenses, burning cities to ash, and slaughtering populations with merciless efficiency. This cycle went on and on till a girl who was born as a result of pure love between a human and a demon ascended to godhood. She was a paradox, a living testament to the possibility of harmony in a world consumed by discord, a beacon of hope born from an unlikely embrace. Her existence was a miracle, a flicker of light in the perpetual twilight of war, a symbol of what could be, a divine anomaly that defied all logic. As she grew, her innate power blossomed, a unique blend of both human and demonic essence, elevating her beyond mortal comprehension, beyond the petty squabbles of her kin. She knew very well the truth about humans and demons being violent by nature and could not find a way to fix their relationships. She understood that their conflict was not merely a matter of territory or resources, but a deeply ingrained flaw, a primal urge for dominance that transcended reason. She searched for a solution, a way to mend the irreparable rift, to bring true peace to her warring parents' races, to end the suffering she had witnessed for so long. But she found none. The animosity was too deep, the wounds too old, the cycles too ingrained to be broken by conventional means. So in the end she decided to take the bravest of both to fight each other. In a desperate, final act, a decision born of profound sorrow and a grim understanding of reality, she devised a perverse game, a twisted form of peace through perpetual, controlled conflict. She chose the bravest, the strongest, from both sides, pitting them against each other in an eternal struggle, believing that by channeling their destructive urges, she could prevent total annihilation, a lesser evil to prevent a greater one, sacrificing a few to save many.
In the demon's side, she gave a demon named ኣርኩአሽ or Arkuess the power of undying. He became an immortal terror, an unstoppable force, a living embodiment of the demonic will to survive. He could be defeated, dismembered, even scattered, but never truly killed. He would always return, his power regenerating, his malice undiminished, a perpetual threat to humanity, a shadow that could never truly be vanquished, only temporarily contained. At the same time, she gave the power of sealing and transfer to a brave man named ጭhoር크 or Chork. He was a beacon of hope, a champion for mankind, a counterpoint to the undying demon, a perpetual line of defense. With these power, the demon king could not be killed, and the power gained by the first hero could be transferred to his offspring, ensuring a continuous line of defense against the eternal threat, a perpetual guardian for humanity. But to not lose the concentration of the power, the off springs were forced to commit incest. This was a grim necessity, or so they were told, a brutal sacrifice to preserve the potency of the sealing magic, to ensure the survival of their world, a terrible price for continued existence, a violation of their very humanity. The cost was devastating. Their immunity, their very life force, was eroded, leaving them vulnerable to the simplest of ailments. A common cold, a fleeting fever – these trivial maladies became death sentences. They succumbed, generation after generation, to mere sniffles, their divine power unable to shield them from the fragility of their corrupted bodies. Each generation grew weaker, more sickly, their lives tragically cut short, until the direct line of succession was all but extinguished, a proud lineage reduced to a whisper, a cautionary tale of divine interference gone awry.
The left were branch families who had no idea how to seal the demon king. What remained were distant cousins, their lineage diluted, their connection to the original power tenuous, a faint echo of its former glory. They were spared the terminal weakness of the main line, but at a terrible cost. Their knowledge of the sealing power, the intricate rituals and arcane incantations required to bind the Demon King, became a distant whisper, a forgotten secret swallowed by the relentless march of time and the tragic consequences of their ancestors' choices. The art of sealing the Demon King was lost to mankind, a desperate hope extinguished, leaving them once more vulnerable to the immortal terror, their only defense a fading memory of a lost power, a reliance on the unpredictable whims of fate.
A millennium passed. A thousand years of struggle, of humanity teetering on the brink, constantly besieged by the encroaching darkness, their only defense a dwindling hope and the occasional, desperate victory. The legends of Chork and the lost sealing power became mere bedtime stories, cautionary tales, their truth fading into myth. Then, a glimmer of hope, a whisper of salvation from the divine. The saintess Christina, a revered figure whose prophecies were rarely wrong, delivered an oracle. It spoke of a hero, a savior from another world, who would possess the lost power of sealing, a miracle worker who would restore balance to a world on the precipice of despair. And so, Kenshiro Yoshida was summoned. He bore the sacred power, a miraculous intervention, a fleeting reprieve from the endless war, a sudden, unexpected light in the encroaching gloom. His arrival sent ripples of hope through the beleaguered human kingdoms, a promise of a future free from the perpetual threat of Arkuess, a chance to finally break the cycle, to find true peace after millennia of conflict.
But on the short side, the hero did not have the power to transfer his powers to his off springs, but only had the power to pass down his teachings. His power, unlike Chork's, was not transferable through blood. He could not pass down his innate ability, the divine spark that allowed him to seal the Demon King, to his offspring. All he could impart were his teachings, his strategies, his combat prowess, his understanding of the demonic threat, the wisdom he had accumulated through countless battles and observations of this alien world. He established academies, trained generations of warriors, and codified the knowledge he had gained, leaving behind a legacy of martial arts and strategic thinking, a blueprint for survival. But the core power remained unique to him. When he eventually passed, the sealing ability died with him, leaving humanity once more in a precarious position, forced to rely on divine intervention rather than inherited strength, hoping for another miracle. Since then, mankind had to summon heroes from another world as to survive themselves. It was a gamble with the fate of their entire civilization, a roll of the dice with their very existence, a desperate plea to the unknown, a lottery for their future.
You might be thinking, why does the first summoned hero and I have the same last name? It seems like it was my father who went missing years ago. And here I was. Kenshiro Yoshida. The same last name. It had hit me like a revelation, a punch to the gut that left me reeling, my mind struggling to reconcile the impossible. My father, who had gone missing years ago, vanished without a trace, leaving behind a void that had never truly been filled, a mystery that had haunted my childhood. He was the first Kenshiro Yoshida, the hero summoned a thousand years ago. I had delved into the fragmented histories, the cryptic texts, the hushed whispers of the elders, searching for answers, for any explanation of this impossible connection. It seemed the summoning wasn't chronological, not a linear progression of events where one hero followed another in neat succession. Instead, heroes were plucked from different times, different dimensions, at random, their arrival dictated by some unknowable cosmic lottery, a cruel game of chance in the face of despair. Anyway, let's gloss over that information.
Now to the 'TRUMP' descendants. The 'TRUMP' descendants are the descendants of the first hero. At least they are what is left of them. These were the last vestiges of the first hero's lineage, the diluted remnants of Chork's bloodline, their ancestral power a mere shadow of its former glory, yet still formidable in its own right. As the name suggests, these families are named after cards from our world. There are four families; namely Diamond, Heart, Club and Spade. These are the families extended by the first hero's four wives, each wife giving rise to a distinct family, named after the suits of a playing card deck, each carrying a fragment of the original hero's legacy, a specialized piece of their ancient power.
Each family had their own specialized area, a particular field in which they excelled, a legacy inherited from the first hero's multifaceted prowess, a distinct branch of the original power. For example, the Diamond family has inherited the first hero's prowess in strategy and swordsmanship. They were the tacticians, the master swordsmen, their minds as sharp as their blades, their bodies honed to perfection through generations of rigorous training. They moved with an almost ethereal grace, their minds constantly calculating, predicting their opponents' every move, their swords extensions of their very will, capable of finding the smallest opening, leading the charge with both cunning and steel. Their training involved not just physical drills but intense mental exercises, war games, and historical battle analyses, ensuring that each new generation was a master of both blade and mind, capable of leading armies and turning the tide of battle with cunning and skill.
The Heart family has inherited the prowess in compassion and support magic. They were the healers, the empathic anchors, their magic focused on mending wounds, bolstering spirits, and safeguarding their allies from physical harm. Their training involved not only the study of healing incantations but also deep psychological understanding, learning to read the emotional states of others, to offer solace and encouragement in the darkest moments, to be the emotional backbone of any fighting force, a source of unwavering hope when despair threatened to overwhelm.
The Club family has inherited the prowess in the area of strength in blunt and hand accessory weapons like clubs, knuckles, etc. Their inheritance was raw, unadulterated strength, a mastery of blunt weapons and hand accessories. Clubs, maces, knuckles, war hammers – anything that delivered a crushing blow was their domain. They were the heavy hitters, the frontline brawlers, their training focused on pure physical might and the devastating impact of their chosen weapons. Their movements were powerful, direct, each strike imbued with immense force, capable of shattering armor and bone alike, leaving a trail of destruction in their wake. Their training involved endless hours of grueling conditioning, honing their bodies into instruments of destruction, pushing their physical limits beyond what seemed humanly possible, building incredible endurance and power. They were the impenetrable shield, the unstoppable hammer, their presence on the battlefield a formidable wall of muscle and unwavering resolve, capable of breaking through even the most stubborn enemy lines with sheer, unadulterated force.
And finally comes Spade family, who specialize in the fields of talking and fortitude magic. They were the speakers, the persuaders, their words as potent as any weapon, capable of swaying armies or defusing tense negotiations with a carefully chosen phrase. They also possessed an uncanny ability to fortify, to strengthen, not just themselves but also their allies, building an almost unbreakable mental and physical resilience against magical and psychological attacks, making them incredibly difficult to break. Their training involved not only the mastery of arcane incantations for protection and endurance but also the subtle art of persuasion, the intricate dance of negotiation, and the strategic use of information, often acting as intelligence gatherers and diplomats, their words as sharp and precise as any blade. They were the glue that held alliances together, the voices that inspired courage in the face of overwhelming odds, the silent bulwark against despair and fear, their fortitude magic allowing them to withstand relentless pressure, both physical and psychological, making them invaluable in prolonged conflicts and sieges.
Their prime duty is to advise the current emperor, who is just a puppet under these four families. His decrees were their suggestions, his decisions their will. Their true power lay in their collective influence, their vast networks of spies and informants, and their iron grip over the military and economy. They were the de facto rulers, their ancestral duties extending far beyond mere counsel, effectively controlling every aspect of the empire from behind the scenes, their power absolute and rarely challenged. But they also have the duty to pass down the teachings and skills acquired by them, ensuring that their unique talents remained within their respective bloodlines, a tradition that had brought us to this very training ground. We, the newly summoned heroes, were just another generation to be molded, to be shaped by their ancient, ingrained knowledge, to be wielded as tools in their perpetual war against the demons, a new wave of instruments for their ancient purpose.
Anyway, the more I seem to spend time in this world, the more wary I feel. It was a cold, insidious feeling, a constant hum of unease beneath the surface of my forced acceptance. It wasn't just the physical exhaustion from the training, or the lingering shock of my displacement. It was a deeper, more existential dread, a sense of foreboding that I couldn't quite shake, a persistent whisper of impending doom that overshadowed even the marvels of this new land. Other kids are enjoying themselves. They were embracing this bizarre new reality with an almost unsettling enthusiasm, as if they had been dropped into a grand adventure novel, a fantastical escape from mundane lives. They laughed, they joked, they bonded over shared exhaustion and minor victories, their youthful optimism a stark contrast to my growing apprehension, a chasm between our perspectives that seemed to widen with each passing day. This group even included Meiko. She is being as carefree as she can be, her vibrant energy and infectious laughter a constant presence in the training grounds, a bright spot in the grueling routine. I think I would too have been like her if I was away from the juvenile. The allure of being away from the mundane, the juvenile struggles and petty concerns of our previous existence, was undeniably appealing. A new world, new powers, a chance to be something more than just another face in the crowd, to escape the suffocating familiarity of our old lives. It was a seductive thought, a chance to rewrite our own stories, to become heroes in a grand epic. The sheer scale of this new reality, the raw magic, the ancient history – it was all very much appreciated, a welcome departure from the predictable, a thrilling unknown. But I think they have forgotten why we were summoned here. The laughter, the camaraderie, the pursuit of new skills – it all felt like a distraction, a temporary reprieve from the grim purpose that hung over our heads, a purpose that I, for one, could not forget. We weren't here for a field trip or a vacation; we were here because this world was desperate, because a terrible, ancient evil required our blood, our sacrifice.